What have you done in the garden today Part 4 Spring 2024.

[MereDintofPandiculation]

What have you done in the garden today? What went well? What surprises have you had? What could have gone better?

The real seed company is out of Etruria cabbage, but I did buy some flower seeds and some beans and peas. So my no veg veg patch is filling up nicely. I wish I had bought some kale and chard, they grow easily here . I might have a few packets in my stinky greenhouse..

The leaves are good if you cut out the main stem, and slice them finely like grass. There’s a Portuguese soup, Calde verde, with their similar Couve galega, which led to an early traveler reporting that the Portuguese ate soup made out of grass

I gave up on veg a long time ago - I tried everything to fight the pests and the disease - too hard and too expensive in money and time. We have a morello cherry - which endured a very short haircut last year and it's only just recovering - I hope it has forgiven us but it was very lopsided and very leggy - think it must have lost its main stem in a storm and went a bit crazy.
Visited a lovely Garden Centre yesterday - lots of jungle type plants, mentally making plans and repotted an olive tree that will now need to rough it outside.

I'm feeling quite relieved... apart from sometimes some runner beans and a few tomatoes I've never tried to grow veg, it seems too much work for not enough gain tbh. I really should try growing some sorts of fruit, but I'm not sure what or where.

Well I'm all about the veg 😳 but I get it, if this rain continues like it has and becomes a cold damp summer I am sunk.

Planted out shallot sets, three types of lettuce, leeks, and sowed beets and carrots outside.

I have made a planting plan for our 17 beds (own garden and allotment) and discovered I need to find more space to grow my eight types of squash! They take up a fair bit of room, too. Four of those beds have permanent residents though: raspberries, strawberries, asparagus/rhubarb and saskatoon bushes.
Please let there not be a cold damp summer, O Weather Gods.

@DougAndTheSlugs can you tie the smaller squashes onto cane pyramids as they grow, and support the fruits as they form? That would massively reduce the footprint of each plant and keeps the squashes out of the way of all but the most determined slugs.

Good thought InMySpareTime, some of them are smaller

I just don’t have the precision for veg gardening. But I’m hoping this year less will be more.@ErrolTheDragon . Fruit really isn’t too hard, start with a pot of strawberries!

I enjoy veg growing and have some raised beds to use but am not prepared to spend the money needed to fill them though I might do one. Something has eaten one of my cucumber plants in the greenhouse and I couldn’t find it so hoping that I don’t go out and everything else is eaten.

@Zebracat can I ask how you are doing now with your hip ? Hope you don’t mind me asking, I am on the waiting list.

I've grown strawberries in the past, I didn't get to eat many of them though! There must be such a thing as a small attractive fruit cage rather than building plant a Colditz?

Ha! I remember when we had some of those pretty but not very practical terracotta strawberry pots. We were about to go on holiday, so built a chicken wire Colditz all around them, to keep the birds at bay. Came home to find it had rained so much that the strawberries had rotted, so Colditz had been pointless. Hey ho.

Rain rain rain here. Feels like we're going to float away soon.

Have had a 100% germination rate in sunflower seeds we harvested from our own plants a couple of years ago, but 0% for the seeds from packets! Hopefully the latter will come up soon.

All of the courgettes (bought) have germinated, as well as the mystery squash seeds we took from veges we get in our weekly vege box. I think they're butternut squash and pumpkin, but I guess we'll find out later!

We've also been very successful with seeds from last season's tomato plants, but less successful with the tomato seeds from packets.

So I guess this all means we'll do more saving of our own seeds and stop buying packets!

We are still doing vegetables as I'm trying to teach the children how to grow their own food (while learning how to do it myself at the same time). We've got quite a lot of space for it so hopefully we'll manage to get some things to grow this year.

There is a school of thought that says plot rotation is not important on garden scale because any nasties will spread across the whole garden anyway

Yesterday I completely weeded and tidied up the upper terrace. Took 4 trugs of weeds and soil down to the compost heap. Today it’s raining. I found one advantage of doing a circuit of the local parks in the rain - with no people around, I was able to see a weasel being escorted off the premises by two angry wrens.

I try to rotate plots mostly so hungry crops follow legumes. That way I don't need to feed the soil as beans fix nitrogen for me. Not too fussed about the pest/disease angle but it's never been an issue, my garden is very sheltered.

Got this tip online somewhere and tried it today- unravel copper washing up scourers and they turn into copper sleeves. I lost all my peas last year so I will try anything.

Looking forward to trying the cut in half grow bag idea as well.

I've sown loads of flowers, nasturtiums, sweet peas, zinnias, strawflowers, Agastache, pink amaranthus, celosia, California poppies.

I've started the hardening off of my beets, lettuces, onions, celery, celeriac, chard, spinach...in amongst the rain.

That's really cool, @Cathpot

Finished planting the 72 lavender plugs. Moved the buddleia to a spot by the front gate which should mean it gets plenty of sun (if it ever stops raining...) Fed all the roses.

Weeded the block paved driveway (loathe that job) and have now bought a huge 2m long raised planter to fill a boring and unloved spot under the sitting room window. It'll be against a north-facing wall and in a rain shadow though so I'm not quite sure what I'm going to fill the damn thing with. I do know I want lots of trailing ivy and some year-round colour / interest. Suggestions welcome!

I noticed some planters outside a gardening shop which was north facing and got a lot of rain during last year. The notably striking thing in it was a brunnera with huge silvery leaves and blue flowers spikes over a very long period ( not just spring). I'm not sure if it had foliage all through the winter, brunneras usually don't but it definitely had a very long season there. I'm meaning to get some - I went in and asked what it was, they didn't have any but told me it was Alexander's Great - like a giant Jack Frost. (I think they had Ivy, ferns and some sort of spiky things as well)

@Seaitoverthere . The surgery was brilliant, and I had very little pain. But I have had a couple of complications with my recovery. Very weak buttock muscles on one side, and bursitis in the hip. I’m now waiting for shock wave therapy. So walking is still a bit tricky and I need a stick, 10 months on.. but I have much less pain( except walking),and I can put on my own socks. I’ve had excellent care, it’s not anyones fault. I think part of the problem is that I’d actually had a really uneven gait for years because of a spinal issue. Top tips: do your physio and compression leggings help to support the hip.
In the garden, I sowed some tomato seeds and some dwarf asters, as dinner was cooking, so that I could say I’d done something in the garden. Very jealous of the weasel episode. I love it when little birds win.

What a great idea with the copper scorers and a great image with the wrens and the weasels!

Only thing I did yesterday was survey second cucumber plant having been eaten in the greenhouse.

@Zebracat I’m so sorry to hear that , burisitis is horrible. I have very weak muscles one side where my hip has been weak for ages. Putting socks on sounds good, am looking forward to that. I might need bone graft apparently as cysts in hip socket which sounds a bit grim but she said it is no big deal .

Annoying to be limited in what I can do in the garden but I have been pleased that I can do something, decent tools make a big difference along with my folding chair . Really I should pay someone to come and do the pruning, stripping out a couple of flower beds, dig pond , some planting and sort greenhouse out then I try to keep on top of it but I’m currently a bit skint after the house renovation and a big part of me wants to be able to do it myself.

@TheSandHurtsMyFeelings I have a similar planter in a shady corner, it's been a bit experimental but I have a small acer in there, a heuchera, some pulmonaria, and some ornamental black grass that I don't know the name of. I also have a shrub type honeysuckle in there that seems very happy.

The last few days were very dispiriting. I planted out three types of lettuce babies only to find them eaten up the next morning. They were under fleece to keep the animals from digging and the birds from eating but they were not protected from slugs. I have some I kept back that can fill the empty spaces, but they may just be second helpings for the slug bastards. I don't usually have such a problem with slugs but it has been a very wet year and I guess they are loving it.

On the windiest of windy days (today) I mattocked, raked flat, and covered the area that has been a home for nettles, brambles and dock for more than thirty years. Long lengths of landscape fabric and wind are an amazing combination. I am utterly exhausted. There were many cups of tea. See below.

Then I mowed.

Very warm but blowing a gale here today!

Can anyone recognise these two plants for me? One is like a variegated Hosta, but is so healthy and vigorous I suspect it may be a weed. The other I planted - and I can't remember what it is, It's a bit like coriander with purple flowers!